Moments later I’m strapping Sarah into her car seat, both she and I wearing dopey grins on our faces. “No-no,” Sarah says, wagging her finger at me, apropos of nothing. I sigh heavily as I buckle myself in, lock the doors, and start up my beater of a car, then wave goodbye to Henry. I watch him walk away with the gait of a chilled-out man who is in no hurry.
“I know, Sarah. I know. Dating my boss is a no-no,” I whimper.
Checking my phone, I’m happy to see I’ve got a text from Rocket. But what she has to say chills me to the bone. Carl left me a voicemail. He didn’t sound threatening. Just wanted to know if I know where you are. Don’t worry, I’m not calling him back.
I shake my head and think, That guy better watch out if he’s going to start harassing Rocket. Jet’s a Navy Reserve pilot and will knock Carl’s soft ass into the dirt without breaking a sweat.
I hate that my friends are involved in my drama now. But I’m also grateful for it.
“You shouldn’t go there.”
Those are the words of my neighbor at the crappy little apartment complex on the morning of my first day of work.
Helen, who lives in 1B, launches into a whole story about Henry Wood’s uncle as soon as I mentioned I was going to work at the Wood’s Pumpkin Patch.
“You know what they did to this town, don’t you?”
“I have no idea, Helen,” I say, sipping my Diet Coke while Sarah tugs me to the car. I’ve given up on the wrap; the girl needs to move those legs. “Auntie. House.” Ever since I told Sarah that Rocket would be watching her today while I went to work, she’s been campaigning to leave immediately.
Ordinarily, I love a toddler-adjacent excuse to stop talking to the meddling Helen, but this time I’m intrigued. I’m about to find out what a terrible person Henry is.
“Just a minute, Sarah, the grown-ups are talking.”
She continues to tug and squeal and judging by her tone, I have about two minutes before the screaming begins.
“Well. His uncle Howie scammed everyone in town. Got everyone to invest in his scheme to build a rainforest museum for children. Said it would be the only one like it in the whole country. He had blueprints, he had a developer come and speak to the town. People gave him money, but the building never happened. And then he died, and nobody knows what happened to the money.”
“That’s awful,” I say, full of sympathy. Nobody should get scammed out of their money, no matter how nosy they are. “But that doesn’t explain why everyone hates Henry for what his uncle did.”
Helen rests her hands on her hips. “Well, how about this? When the investors approached Henry, he said he didn’t have the money. He said he had power of attorney for all of his uncle’s accounts—and there were many because he also engaged in check kiting—and every last one of them was empty. Then Henry told everyone who came calling that he was not legally obligated to pay back his uncle’s debts.”
I bite my lip, already regretting what I’m about to say. “That’s sad but, legally, he’s not obligated to pay them back.”
Helen looks affronted. “But it’s the right thing to do!”
I twist my mouth and consider how to respond to this in a way that will keep peace with my neighbor. “The law doesn’t agree unless you were all considered stakeholders and there were contracts drawn up. What was the promised ROI? You could demand some kind of payout from his assets.”
Her blank stare tells me she knows way less about this situation than she claims.
I should hold my tongue but I can’t help it. “It sucks. But risk is built into investing. It hurts to not get your money back, yes. I sympathize. You and the others can certainly sue Howie’s estate. But from a legal standpoint, Henry has broken no laws, and you’re not likely to win in court.”
Helen grunts. “We looked into a lawsuit, but it costs too much money to hire a lawyer to do all that poking around.”
My guess is, no lawyer would take that case, but I don’t say that out loud.
“Did you, yourself, lose money to Uncle Howie?”
Helen shakes her head. “Not me personally, but I say ‘we’ as in the whole community. We were all hurt by what happened.”
Sounds like she’s being a bit melodramatic, but I don’t say that either.
“And then,” Helen continues, now getting really wound up, “he goes and buys a bunch of land to open a pumpkin patch, of all things? What are we supposed to think? That he didn’t have Howie’s money—our money—stashed away somewhere? Oh, he said it all came from savings, but trust me. Follow the money, dear. You’ll see.”
Chapter Four
Henry
How did I get here? What does all this mean? I think, sipping my coffee and looking out at the corn maze, visible just down the hill from my front porch. Beyond the corn maze is the pumpkin patch, and I can see Big Daddy from up here.
I’m not wondering how I got here with the corn maze or the pumpkin patch. I know exactly how obsessed I get once I latch on to an idea. I’m not regretting any of that.
What I’m wondering about is, why in the world would I give a job to a woman I like and want to date?
“Because I’m a good guy and she needs a job, and no way was I going to let her work for that schmuck at the supermarket,” I say to no one.
No, because she’s cute and your first instinct was to keep her as close to you as possible, which means seeing her every day. And the only way to
